Scientific Predictions & their Implications
Scientific Predictions & their Implications
On Religious Belief & The Age of Modern Reason
“During those 100 years, the rationale for defending a flat Earth has become progressively absurd. They'll never run out of evidence for a flat Earth, but the fact that their evidence is being demonstrated as becoming progressively more absurd tells us that they don't have a strong case.” –Hugh Ross (Creationist/Astrophysicist?)
1) Neuroscience and evolutionary psychology will map out how supernatural and religious thought develop in the human brain so that we will be virtually 100% certain that religion is a manmade social and cultural phenomenon.
2) The theory of evolution will continue to prove itself with new undeniable proofs and subsequently align with new biological, genetic, and archeological information and/or discoveries and thereby continue to provide reliable answers where religion does not.
3) Natural sciences will begin to make light of morality offering a sound and reliable foundation for not only human morality, but also human consciousness, and our perceptions.
4) Epistemological roots of human understanding will no longer be a vague and nebulous conception left to religious patriarchs to define as they wish, but rather, will be explained steadily and systematically by hard won scientific knowledge. In other words, we will begin to have an understanding of how we understand and perceive reality at the brain via the aforementioned sciences of neurobiology and evolutionary psychology; i.e. it will no longer be a question of “why” but simply a matter of “how” and “by what cause…” Accordingly, this epistemic naturalism will replace all epistemic metaphysical assumptions.
5) Philosophy already offers many adequate, if not superior, arguments for morality. The natural moral arguments, along the lines of Kant, will become the standard axioms of truth as the natural sciences begin to confirm the relationships between morality, nature, and our perceptions along with our experiences.
6) Once a solid naturalism is established theorists and philosophers will take the scientific framework and create an overall portrait of the moral landscape of humans and all living species and will likely better define us as distinctive in our cognitive functions, self awareness, and unique language abilities but also show how we are interrelated with every other living thing; this will tie directly back into our genetic lineage and further validate evolution.
7) Cosmology and Physics have refuted Intelligent Design beyond a reason of a doubt and will continue to make all earth religions obsolete as it actively refutes all remaining “god hypothesis.”
8) As our cosmological understanding becomes greater it will lend to enhance and support the natural understanding of the universe, our world, and all the living things which exist—but more importantly—will begin to unravel the mysteries of why we exist at all; as it is already doing.
9) Once a fully actualized natural worldview has been established people will either embrace it or deny it, but none will be unaware of it or its implications. As such, I foresee, a continued secularization where natural philosophies encroach upon religious territory and usurp religious beliefs and replace them with a more thorough and accurate understanding of the world.
10) Religion will persevere, but it will exist in a diminutive form as traditional observances and age old habits of custom rather than active beliefs. Science, having comprehensively disproved religious claims, will have given us good solid reasons to be skeptical of any further incredible and unsupported future claims, making it difficult for religion to overcome the burden of proof in consecutive generations of learned scientific understanding—that is ‘the age of modern reason’.
Thes predictions are a ways off yet, perhaps anywhere from sixty to a hundred or so years before these predictions become a viable reality. Even as such, you may have noticed the uncommon Creationist quote at the top, which is, wholly accurate as far as I can tell. Indeed, the implications of scientific advancement are the same across the spectrum, that is: it makes all supernatural and mystical supposition as well as all of the speculative theological arguments more absurd, more incredible, and more unbelievable. So to amend the epigraph to encompass the entire array of esoteric theological creationist conjecture, as well as all the faith-based bombastic B.S., we are left with this weighty implication: During the time religions have flourished and thrived, the rationale for defending their doctrinaire claims, core beliefs, and theological speculations have become progressively absurd. They’ll never run out of “evidence” for their tenuous assumptions, but the fact is that their evidence is being demonstrated as becoming progressively more absurd tells us that they don’t have a strong case.
As much as I would like to agree with you, I fear that this may be a little too utopian to hope for. I hate to say this, but religion will persist despite all contrary evidence. People will not give it up. There are many people out there who say that they need it because they are "sinners" and believe that Jesus and God are the only things that prevent them from raping, killing, and stealing from others. However, this is a great thought.
ReplyDeleteTink-
ReplyDeleteWhat you said was basically a more pessimistic version of my #10--that religion will persevere an ongoing secularization.
I think the difference here is that you said persist. I think you mean the ignorance religion sponsors will persist as long as there is religion.
On that we both agree. However, for me, having been a Christian who has seen the light, so to speak, and since become enlightened and freed of such ignorance, I know that there is something which does break the spell of religion.
REASON.
Now, as scientific knowledge and understanding grows, and the age of modern reason progresses, I see that religious audacity is going to be attacked on all sides by brute hard fact and undeniable evidence so superfluous that the supernatural gets crushed by the weight of its own inadequacy.
How many will choose to remain ignorant, and how many will begrudgingly accept the new evidence as undeniable truth I cannot likely say. But odds are, the winning side is going to be the hard won truth gained via our new insights and understandings, and not the credulous worship of things too tenuous to believe any more.
So although I see religion sticking around, I also see it going nowhere fast. Science is where the real understanding and advancement is. And even religious believers can believe in science and still hold to their sacred sacraments and sanctimonious practices, but my hope is that this supernatural and blinkered way of thinking will one day become the minority rather than the majority.
I don't think that's too utopian... I think it's the trend... since all other trends point to it. For me, it's only a matter of time.
Although my Post-Theist opinion might be influenced by my having put my faith aside, which is why I probably sound so optimistic. For me religion is an obvious dead end, but I can see how others might not be persuaded.
ReplyDeleteYet I would pepper this with some optimistic hope, because as you well know, Christians continually rant and rail about how liberal everything is getting and each year they have that much more to complain about. Which just goes to show—Christians aren't entirely unaware of the secularization and the encroaching reason which will shrink-wrap their faith into pristine little packets which can be served, like TV dinners, as quick sustenance for those who desperately need that quick religious fix.
This is where all the right wing caterwauling is focused all the time—on the adversary—anything that would seek to dethrone religion from its lofty and inviolable status. Mainly anything which tries to liberalize their views from the religiously conservative ones they were raised in.
The "we're all sinners thing...” and the “…if it wasn't for Jesus saving grace I'd still be a prostitute, gay, or a druggie" is more or less simply brainwashing by Christian dogmatic elements. Religious psychology shows how these beliefs of self depravity, loathing, and insecurity all fit the psychology of those who think a certain way... they need authority figures in their lives. And for them it is easy to get sucked into the slave mentality of religious belief, because then they have regiment order, they can appeal to a higher authority, and their lives can be put back on track, and this religion can do quite well.
The problem is that the belief is degenerate. Believing you can only get anywhere by serving another or adhering to a hierarchy is totalitarian... and this ultimately limits one's freedoms and cancels out any true sovereignty. Making a self actualized existence impossible. Living for Christ sounds nice as long as it is a personal affair, but when it seeks to impede upon public policy, when do-gooder Christians want others to live as they live, and impose the same rules authority on the State, then this crosses a line. Not everyone dreams of grown up a slave.
But I think that's why the separation of Church and State is so vitally important, it keeps the religious domain from forcing people to be it’s serfs (as it once did), and this separation opens up ample room for civil laws as well as natural ethical philosophies to proliferate, and these can do a good job of substituting this need to appeal to something higher than us. The problem comes down to knowledge. To clarify: more people know about the ten commandments than anything that Kant philosophized. Why? Because their parents taught them the ten commandments and took them to Sunday school, but never taught Kant. So here, at the brink of mass secularization, both the separation of Church and State along with higher education become important.
If believers are not given a better alternative to the ten commandments, for example, then they will keep believing in the ten commandments as the only “moral laws” even though they’re piss poor ones at that. They just don’t know any better, because they were never taught any better alternatives, and therefore their ignorance takes over. The best sort of slave is an ignorant slave—the slave who doesn’t even know what they’re a slave. Wanting to be a slave, like my Christian friend always professes, “I want to be a slave for Christ! I couldn’t imagine my life without Jesus in it…” just goes to show how indoctrination and the appeal to authority work in tandem within the religious institution. Religious longing will override weak constitutions, and they'll always go back to their idol worship--gazing upon Mooby the golden calf in awe... for how does he sparkle!
ReplyDeleteYes, there is a danger this will persist. We must not let it. And that’s where my advocacy comes in. By correcting their assumptions, addressing their misunderstandings, and giving them the proper information then we can take a sledge hammer of truth and reason and bash their ignorance to smithereens. Once educated, reason will slowly compel them toward better understanding, and minus their ignorance religious authority won’t have so much a hold over them.
So blog on sister! Blog on!